We're so happy to talk about violence,

we're so quick to question love and someone's good intentions,

because we don't trust it.

That's a fair assessment. I think the answer to that is,

not that you asked that rhetorically, I think the answer to that is

because race trumps everything in this country.

-It does, and so does sexism. -Indeed.

-And then ageism. -Absolutely.

It's like we make a joke, but we women are on the back burners.

You were saying about a certain age, you hit an age,

why don't we work anymore? Well, I'd say...

You know, Will Smith is probably going to work a lot longer than I am.

He's a brilliant actor who happens to be a man of color

and very talented, but we women are still kind of

You know, it's sort of like India.

The flip side of this race conversation we're having now for me,

and you and I have just met for the first time,

but the thing that I have adored about you, and I mean that deliberately,

the thing I've most adored about you, aside from the fine work that you do,

is that I... and I want to ask you about this...

I just know how this business works. I know that behind the scenes

there had to be some fights to get Lopez in prime time.

I always tell people, aside from all the great work that Sandra Bullock does,

Sandra Bullock was the exec producer. She produced George Lopez.

Getting a Hispanic in prime time. I saw you on the show...

He's Hispanic?

So weird. I'm so uncomfortable right now, this is awkward.

This is very awkward.

He's got his late-night show now, and congratulations, George.

I saw you on there not long ago. Take me back and just,

since we're talking about race, tell me what you had to do.

How that happened, to get this show in prime time.

I know the word "race" is something that's here and it's powerful,

and unfortunately it's still very prevalent.

I was raised in a family of artists. My parents were brilliant musicians,

so the people that were in our house were the best musicians.

-Your mother an opera singer. -Opera singer; my dad, opera singer

and voice teacher. So everyone under our roof,

gay, straight, Black, White, Asian, Chinese, Hispanic,

was there because they were brilliant at what they did.

So I fortunately didn't come out of the womb

and the womb of the house with a gauge on who was better

and who was not. I knew who I loved, and there were all the colors

of the rainbow within that love.

So when I approached the "George Lopez Show",

we saw his comedy act and he...

the man's brilliant. Anyone who can make you genuinely laugh

and moved and cry and tell a story all by himself on that stage

deserves to have a forum to do so, and he just blew me away.

He was better than any idea that we came up with.

I said, "The ideas that we have are stupid.

This man's life is far more interesting and powerful,

because it's everyone's life."

Family dysfunction, love, heartache, loss of a caregiver, kids,

your sexiness, your stupidity. It has no color again.

So when someone told me, "No one wants to see a Mexican on TV"

I had the same, I was like, "He's Mexican?"

"Interesting. Is he legal?"

No. It's like, what do you want me to say?

You know what?

The R-word is here. It bums me out that it's still here, but it is.

But what I like is that people aren't afraid to talk, and talk about

once we stop talking and having great debates

amongst men and women, gay and straight,

Black and White, if we stop doing that we're going to go backwards.

I think it's kind of old school, guess what?

We're all different colors. No one is completely White or Black.

I'm every mix. You keep going back, it gets more colorful,

and I love it.

Life is good when you're around the George Lopezes.

Life is good when you have a moment like the Tuohys did,

where they did it out of love.

That family would fight for their son like

it's like a mother bear and her cub.

I was looking at Stephanie, our producer,

and I were talking a little while ago and we were looking at some numbers,

looking at some demographics, which I don't typically look at

but she wanted me to see these numbers because it tells a fascinating story

about the success of "The Blind Side,"

and I'm coming to "The Proposal" in just a second.

For all the "Proposal" fans, hold tight, I'm coming there.

Yes, please, please. I'm not just about "The Blind Side."

-Yeah. -Go ahead.

I'm coming to that thing in just a second.

But the numbers are fascinating on this.

So many of these blockbusters end up being driven by New York and L.A.,

as you know, they drive these. This movie, you know this,

this movie is being driven by the middle.

It's being driven by everyday people in Middle America,

not being driven by New York and L.A. What do you make of that, if anything?

You know what? As long as I've been in this business,

when they show you that little graph and the numbers and testing,

I pretend like I know what they're talking about.

I go, "Oh, yeah, I see there's a 69 in that thing there,

and that's great, isn't it? Right? That's good, right? Okay, awesome."

I don't know. You know what, I totally go instinctually...

I go instinctually towards what makes me proud

and makes me feel like it's a big middle finger

to everyone who said I couldn't do it,

because I hope there's a bunch of girls and ladies behind me

that are wanting to do the same thing and better

that I need to sort of blaze a path for.

And so many women did it for me, and it's our job.

So hopefully in a couple of years we can stop saying,

"A woman has opened a film." We just go,

"It's a good film. It's a good film."

But you got to admit that's pretty cool, though,

-what you pulled off last year. -Kind of cool, yeah. Kind of cool.

-That's pretty cool. -Kind of cool, yeah. If I may gloat.

-You can gloat, you've earned it. -Thank you. Okay, I'm going to gloat.

And the numbers prove it. Speaking of the numbers,

let's talk about that other movie, "The Proposal."

I don't even know what to ask about this movie

because there's been so much talk about "The Blind Side."

Were these things planned to come out in the same year?

-No. Everything... -It never happens

-plan that way. -It never happens.

Everyone's like, "You've done so much work this year."

I said, "No, it's been over two years.

They just all decided to come out at that time."

"The Proposal," someone allowed a girl to be the dude.

The guys have the fast lines, they can be an a-hole,

they can, but they still redeem themselves.

It doesn't have to be huge, just a little, tiny bit.

You've got to have the guy stuff, and it was such a relief for me

to play the guy, because you didn't have to be nice all the time,

you could be crabby for about three months and say,

"Oh, I'm acting, it's part of the character."

I got to play the dude, and it made me so happy.

I want to go back to the point you made about your family earlier,

coming from a family of artists,

most of them musical artists, though, yes?

-All musical artists, yeah. -All musical artists. How did you..

My sister's a pastry chef and a writer, so she's got the music in her soul.

-Yeah, yeah. -But she's putting it into

a loaf of bread.

How'd you end up not in the music field and in the..

Well, I was as a youth.

In Europe when my mother performed I was always in the operas

as some dirty Gypsy kid, because there's always

in every opera, you'll notice there's some dirty Gypsy child,

and that was me. So that's as close,

I played piano and danced all my life,

but I think when you have parents who are that skilled

at an art form that takes diligence and practice every single day,

they set a bar pretty high, and I was listening to Motown

and hip-hop and R&B while they were playing classical music,

and I'm at the piano playing classical music, going,

"This doesn't feel right. It doesn't feel right."

We have music all over our house all the time,

but my parents were so brilliant at what they did

that unless you aspired to that level, don't even try it.